


The Officers' Wives Club (And Pete)

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Comment Fic 2017 [19]
Category: Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-06
Updated: 2017-02-06
Packaged: 2018-09-22 13:19:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,398
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9609182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: Written for the fic_promptly prompt: "SGA, John/Nancy, what if they stayed together?"If John and Nancy had stayed together, Nancy would have made friends with some of the other SGC officers' wives (and Pete).Fluffy and a little crack-y.





	

After everything went to hell in a handcart in Afghanistan, John was devastated. Broken. Within an inch of resigning his commission. Nancy was a lawyer, Nancy knew the score, but she didn't care that her calls to John while he was in the brig were monitored. She called him and told him that she loved him, that she'd be beside him no matter what. He couldn't tell her the details - that was fine. Leave that up to his JAG officer. She didn't care that part of his job was classified. Huge portions of her job were covered by attorney-client confidentiality. There were things neither of them could talk about to each other, that they desperately needed to process, and Nancy understood that.

So she promised him she'd stick with him through thick and thin, and he told her he loved her, and she was sure things would be okay. John loved flying, and for him to have to give that up would have killed him.

And then the brass sent him to McMurdo. A literal freeze-out till he finished his twenty and was forced to retire.

The Air Force was everything John had been since he'd been eighteen years old, and it was going to end like this.

Nancy spent a fortune in long-distance calls, video calls, and even plane tickets to spend time with him. He seemed - at peace, actually. Told her how beautiful the skies were, how vast the stars. One time he helped her into the heaviest duty cold weather gear he could find, and together they trekked away from the base, sprawled out on the ice, and stargazed. It was like being at Stanford again, sprawled in the bed of John's pick-up truck, imagining life in the wider universe.

And then something happened. Nancy couldn't tell if it was good or bad. Involved John transporting some three-star across the ice. A near-miss. And John was ordered to undergo some medical testing.

And he was being transferred to Petersen in Colorado. So much closer to Nancy. She had reciprocity, could apply for the Colorado bar and get accepted to practice without having to sit another exam (she'd taken three for John; that was love).

"What's going on? What medical testing?"

"That's classified."

"Are you okay? Are you sick?"

"No, I'm fine. Better than fine, I promise. I'll see you soon."

John ended up being transferred out to Colorado Springs, in Deep Space Telemetry. For his math skills, he said, a wry twist to his lips. Nancy knew a cover story when she heard it, but she wasn't going to pry, because they were in the same time zone and the same state and the same city and the same house, and all John had to do was drive up the mountain in the morning, and he'd be home by supper.

One night he had a very serious conversation with Nancy, about a mission he'd been selected for, top secret, very dangerous, duration unknown. It could make or break his career.

"I just - I don't think I can do this. To us," John said. He was poking at his carrots but not actually eating them. Nancy pretended not to notice, just like he pretended to like them because she did.

"But if it's for your career -"

"It could be a one-way trip. I can't do that. Not to you. I love you. There are risks I'll take for this country, but none of this matters, not without you."

John was a faithful, loyal, loving husband. He was demonstrative - would do chores without being asked, would surprise Nancy at the office with flowers if he got off of his shift early. But when it came to words, he was careful with them. Words had an unspoken power that he rarely wielded. For him to say that meant something.

So Nancy nodded. "Okay. I trust your judgment. You know your career and the mission better than I do."

John nodded. "I just - I think I'll always be Major Sheppard."

Nancy leaned across the table and kissed him. "And that's okay."

He was given a new post at work, something he couldn't explain, something that required him to be stuck at the base overnight sometimes, but he was excited about it. Given how cheerful he was, Nancy couldn't begrudge him the newfound happiness and job satisfaction, but it meant she was at loose ends, without John around.

Because both of them worked, getting a dog was out of the question, and Nancy wasn't a cat person. So she found herself roaming the local Blockbuster more than she ever had before, picking movies she knew John wouldn't sit still for, romantic comedies and period dramas and the occasional legal thriller.

She was reaching for a copy of _Runaway Jury_ when another woman reached for it at the same time.

"Oh, sorry." The other woman had a bit of a southern drawl, a sweet smile. She snatched her hand back. "You can have it. I was just - a friend recommended it."

Nancy already had a stack of DVDs to while away the nights while John was stuck doing overnight observations of distant celestial events or whatever. "No, you can. I have plenty to keep me busy."

"Are you sure?"

Nancy nodded. "Really. I am. I just rent stacks and stacks of movies my husband won't watch while he's away, and I have a pretty big stack as it is." She hefted her armful for emphasis.

The other woman smiled. "Me too. Cam's in the Air Force, and I have no idea what's going on up at that mountain, but sometimes he's gone for a few days at a stretch."

Nancy's eyes lit up. "Me, too! I mean, my husband, John, he's stationed at Cheyenne Mountain."

"John - not John Sheppard?" the woman asked.

Nancy nodded.

"Cam talks about Shep all the time. My husband's Major Cameron Mitchell."

"Mitchell." The name was familiar, because John was always careful to say the full name, lest he be mixed up with Mitch, from A-stan. "John's mentioned him to me. I'm Nancy." She offered a hand.

"Amy." Her handshake was gentle but confident. "How about we watch this one together? Cam's gone for at least the next three nights. One officer's wife to another."

Nancy, who was wary of the office politics at her firm, still hadn't made many friends in her six months in the Springs. "I'd like that very much."

And that was how it started, The Officers' Wives Club. They'd watch movies together, and go out to dinner together when their husbands were on extended stays at the Mountain. Amy introduced Nancy to Sara O'Neill, who was General O'Neill's wife (General O'Neill being the CO of the base and the man who'd introduced John to his current program), and then the three of them were going to the cinema together, art museums together, and having grand old times while their men were away.

They were sitting in a park, playing a collective game of fetch with Sara's dog Scout (she was retired from being a nurse; her son Charlie was in his first year at The Academy), when they met Pete, who was married to Major Carter, one of the chief astrophysicists at the Mountain. He was jogging and happened to overhear their conversation about the upcoming Officers Ball for the program at the Mountain.

Pete was a detective with the CSPD, and had met Major Carter (Samantha) on a blind date arranged by her brother Mark, and he, too, found himself a bit at loose ends when Sam was on extended research binges. And somehow he became a member of The Club, and bowling and batting cages were added to the roster of activities they did together.

Nancy was glad of this arrangement, glad of her new friends, and happy for John and how satisfying he found his work.

And then one day there was a fireball in the sky, and someone leaked audio recordings of John talking to Sam and Cam and Jack, about nuclear warheads and detonating and sacrifice, and Nancy found out what had really been going on under that Mountain for the past five years.

John staggered home after hours and hours of debriefs, and Nancy told him the news, news that would change his world in the way no alien technology or society ever could.

"I'm pregnant."

 


End file.
